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We are often told that the constitution, our constitution, is the epitome of our (all of us) ideals, values and aspirations. By this, it is assumed, at least, that the ideas of every recognisable unit of our polity as to how to structure and deploy government is represented and reflected in the Constitution; and, subsequently, in the laws of the polity.

According to Marx, however, no set of ideas (values, ideals and aspirations) has ever reflected the true ideas of all the recognisable units of the polity. Rather, “the ruling ideas of every epoch in a polity are the ideas of the ruling class of that epoch.”

In every period in the history of polities, there has only been one ruling class. This ruling class may have several departments; but it is still the ruling class. The ruling class, according to classical Marxist theory, is in constant struggle with the class of the ruled, the oppressed. The ruling class, the theory continues, is the class that owns and controls the resources and the other factors of production in the polity. The other class, the ruled, are nothing but a factor of production – labour – in the hands of the ruling class to used. How does this analytic play out in the making of constitutions?

Well, let’s begin by saying that constitutions are made up of big ideas. Second, big ideas are a product of big thinking. Third, by the very nature of the roles that the classes play, the habit of ‘thinking big’ becomes a luxury. Fourth, by the nature of the relationship and the respective roles of the classes, only the ruling class (call them the bourgeoisie) could afford the luxury of thinking big. The class of the ruled (call them the proletariat), on the other hand, is preoccupied with the habitual thoughts of the next meal (the source of strength for the next day’s labour).

Therefore, to the extent that the constitution is a set of ideas put together and ascribed the status of supreme law, the constitution of every polity (and the entire legal system which rests on it) in every era becomes nothing but a bundle of the ideas (values, ideals and aspirations) of only the ruling class of that era. This is true on both the micro and the macro levels. On a micro level, for instance, the ideas expressed in the 1992 Constitution as law are nothing but the ideas of the ruling class of the era – the PNDC.

On a macro level, take the idea that governmental power should be separated into 3 departments, for example. Separation of powers is nothing but a parochial arrangement between the various departments of the ruling class – the monarch, the MP and the judges – as to how to share power and harmonise the relationship between and among themselves and themselves alone. Separation of powers does not involve the people. Rather, the people are alienated and, in order to keep them at bay, pacified by another mechanism – elections.

In life, generally, we are often encouraged to think outside the box. Whatever that means, the position in the murky world of legal of reasoning is different. In legal reasoning, one is not to reason outside the box unless she completely exhausts the space within the box. In other words, the creation of a new legal rule or a legal fiction should be the last resort in resolving legal problems.

New Law

In Amidu v A-G, Waterville & Woyome (No. 2), the Supreme Court (the “Court”), constituted by a single Justice of the Court, seems to have created a new legal rule, a kind of legal fiction. The learned Justice admitted this when he cited that hallowed passage in Tuffour v A-G as authority for his liberal interpretation of Article 2 of the Constitution. The new rule may be stated as follows:

The right to enforce the Constitution includes the right to enforce an order of the Court enforcing a provision of the Constitution.

This rule is so so that a person who has the right to invoke the enforcement jurisdiction of the Court on a particular issue is deemed as also having the right to personally enforce the execution of the order made by the Court pursuant to the enforcement jurisdiction.

My Claims

In my previous article on this issue, I explained that the Court has, without more, created a qui tam jurisdiction in the Republic. In this article, I make 2 other claims. The first is that the Court, constituted by a single Justice of the Court, has no jurisdiction to interpret Article 2 of the Constitution. My second claim is that, even if the Court did have jurisdiction, there was no need for it to create that new legal rule. For want of space, however, I will limit this discussion to the second claim, not least because I think it is also the most difficult of the 2 claims.

Constitution versus Court Orders

Hon Amidu’s action was hinged on Article 2 of the Constitution. Article 2 deals with enforcement of the Constitution. This means that a person may rely on Article 2 to commence an action for the enforcement of “a provision of this Constitution.” Article 2, at least on the face of it, does not deal with the enforcement of the Court’s orders. There are 2 reasons why Article 2 does not and may not be a basis for enforcing the Court’s order.

The first is that there is a difference between the provisions of the Constitution, on one hand, and the Court’s orders, on the other. Even though the Court’s Article 2 order is always consequent upon its interpretation or application of the provision of the Constitution, the enforcement of those orders involves entirely different consideration, both substantive and procedural, than the factors that the Court considers when it is called upon to enforce a provision of the Constitution.

The second reason is that the Court, when exercising its enforcement jurisdiction, has, itself, the power to order an appropriate person (including the President) to enforce its orders. Therefore, a proper exercise of the Court’s enforcement power should not give rise to a situation where (as here) a new legal rule would have to be created constituting a private person into a public or quasi-public official just to get the Court’s order enforced. In other words, when the Court properly exercises its enforcement powers, the order it gives, without more, becomes a binding legal duty on a person already clothed with public power.

Duty to Enforce

This legal duty, too, comes with at least 3 cardinal incidents: The first incident is that the duty is public (rather than private) in nature. This derives from the fact that a constitutional matter is a public matter; and, conceptually, cannot give birth to an order directed at or enforceable by a private person. The duty to enforce such an order, naturally, could only be performed by a public officer, not a private person.

The second incident of the duty is that the public officer has no discretion in her performance of the duty. This derives from the principle that a public official has no discretion when directed by a court of competent jurisdiction to perform a public function. Indeed, such a public official is bound to perform the duty strictly, precisely and exactly in accordance with the terms of the Court’s order, even if the order is void or voidable.

The third (and last) incident of the duty is that refusal by the public officer (even if that officer is the President) to obey or carry it out precisely and exactly in the terms of the Court’s order constitutes a high crime under the Constitution.

The Substantive Order

From the above, it may be pretty obvious that everything depends on the nature and terms of the Court order in question. The issue, then, is: what is the nature of the Court’s order in the substantive case, that is, the case whose judgement Hon. Amidu now seeks to enforce? In the substantive case, the Court made 3 declarations and only one order. The order states as follows:

“An order directed at the 3rd Defendant [Mr. Woyome] to refund to the Republic of Ghana all sums of money paid to him upon or as a result of the unconstitutional conduct of the 1st Respondent, therein 1st Defendant [the Attorney-General], in purported pursuance of the said inoperative Agreement dated 26 April 2006.”

Indeed, there is nothing wrong with this order until one begins to realise (as we all now have) that the order is directed at the judgment-debtor to pay; and that there is no specific or precise order directed at any public officer to enforce payment. This deficiency (as to “who” should enforce), in itself, is not fatal to the course – the Attorney-General is not without a duty to enforce payment on the ground only that the Court did not expressly say so. This is because (and as Hohfeldian correlatives tell us): to every legal duty there is a correlative legal right and vice versa. Therefore, a duty on a judgement-debtor to pay creates a concomitant right in the judgement-creditor to enforcement payment.

In respect of time of payment, too, lack of express timelines does not mean that the payment may be made at the behest of the judgement-debtor. This is because, one may, again, recall that where (as here) time is of the essence and there is no time given, reasonable time is the time which will apply. Going forward, one may say that the questions of “who” bears the duty and “when” to perform the duty are not unanswered. Indeed, the Attorney-General (a public officer) is under a duty to collect the monies from the judgement-debtor for the Republic within a reasonable time.

How to Enforce

This leaves us with the question of “how” to perform the duty. And this is exactly where Order 46 of CI 47 comes in. The relevant part of the Order says that:

“… where a person has obtained a judgment or order for the payment of money by some other person, hereinafter referred to as “the judgment debtor”, the Court may, on all application made ex-parte by the person entitled to enforce the judgment or order, order the judgment debtor to attend before the Court and be orally examined on the questions …”

There is no doubt that “the person entitled to enforce the judgment or order” on behalf of the Republic here is the Attorney-General or another public officer acting on her advice or directive. Indeed, there are more than one ways by which the Attorney-General may perform this duty; and there is some evidence that the Attorney-General has been using some collection methods.

However, it appears (and Hon Amidu deposes so before the Court) that the Attorney-General has, either unwilling or unable, failed to enforce the Courts orders, at least, in the manner that Hon Amidu expects her to. Indeed, if it is the view of Hon Amidu or another citizen that Order 46 is the best or, even, the only method of enforcing payment, the existing legal regime is not silent on “how” to get the Attorney-General or another public officer to use that method. Particularly, the Civil procedure rules allows a party to:

“upon the discovery of new and important matter or evidence which, after the exercise of due diligence, was not within that person’s knowledge or could not be produced by that person at the time when the judgment was given or the order made, or on account of some mistake or error apparent on the face of the record, or for any other sufficient reason, apply for a review of the judgment or order.”

An application under this rule allows the Court to review and revise its previous order and to make new orders to give proper effect and meaning to its judgement. This rule therefore offers an avenue for the Court to make, if it so wishes, specific orders directed at the Attorney-General, including an order to her to adopt the Order 46 method to enforcing payment.

If the Court does so, the Attorney-General would, as it were, be torn between the choices of committing high crime or obeying the Court’s order. This, no doubt, would have delivered the same result of getting the judgement enforced by the Order 46 methodology without necessarily creating a new rule, which in turn puts the Court’s ruling at war with well-established jurisdictional and jurisprudential positions.

Outside the Box

It seems obvious, therefore, that the Court has absolutely no reason to create a new rule to solve a problem for which a solution already exists at law. In other words, the Court has not exhausted the space within the box before venturing into creating the new legal rule; and, most importantly, doing so without being certain of its jurisdiction.

You have heard of the writ of certiorari, the writ of mandamus, the writ of habeas corpus, and other similar writs. But I bet you have never heard of the writ of qui tam. There is a reason. The writ of qui tam is an old form of action in England & Wales. ‘Qui tam’ is the short form for the Latin phrase ‘qui tam pro domino rege quam pro se ipso in hac parte sequitur’, meaning ‘he who sues in this matter for the King as well as for himself.’

Generally, all criminal and civil prosecutions of and for the King are to be carried out by the Attorney-General only and only her. This position of the law was handed down to all common law countries, including Ghana. However, the writ of qui tam allows a private person to prosecute a case, usually involving some pecuniary loss to the King, on behalf of the King without necessarily having recourse to the A-G. When she wins, the private person is entitled to a share, usually a third, of the recovery as of right.

For a writ of qui tam to apply to a transaction, it must be specifically provided by law. So in 1381, for instance, it was enacted under King Edward II that:

“… no officer in City or in Borough … shall merchandise for Wines … And if any do, and be thereof convict, the Merchandize whereof he is convict shall be forfeit to the King, and the third part thereof shall be delivered to the Party that sued the Offender, as the King’s Gift …”

A similar law was enacted in in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in 1686 under King James II and VII, where “penalties for fraud in the sale of bread [are] to be distributed one third to inspector who discovered the fraud and the remainder for the benefit of the town where the offense occurred.” President Lincoln would in, I think, 1863 cause a law to be enacted in a similar light to deal with corrupt war profiteering.

In 1943, however, qui tam was substantially curtailed in the US. An aspect of the old writ would, however, be re-introduced and expanded beyond government contacts to the private financial sector in 2010 by the False Claims Act. In the meantime, the writ was, for good reasons, completely abolished in England & Wales by the Common Informers Act (14 & 15 Geo. 6, c. 39) in 1951 and never revived.

I have found no evidence that the writ of qui tam entered into the Ghana (or Gold Coast) legal system as a statute of general application. Neither was the Supreme Court of the Gold Coast (the predecessor of the current Superior Court of Judicature of Ghana) endowed under the Gold Coast Courts Ordinance Cap. 4 (1876) with the inherent jurisdiction over this form of action. Also, I have not found that the writ has entered into a common law jurisdiction as a statute of general application under any of the UK Judicature Acts.

Therefore, the Supreme Court’s decision this morning, at least, raises a number of questions worth the attention of students of law, namely:

What is the jurisdictional basis for the Supreme Court’s decision?

What does the Constitution say about the power to prosecute claims for and on behalf of the State? Does the Constitution contemplate an exception to the general rule in Article 88? If so, under what circumstances may the exception kick in?

Does the fact that the Whistleblowers Act (which follows the spirit of the qui tam cause) retains the power of prosecution of public wrongs for the A-G alone speak to the question?

Is the Court creating a new form of action? If so, what is the constitutional basis for such creativity (desirable, though, it may be), having in mind that courts and their jurisdiction are creatures of statute?

Indeed accountability is good, but there is no greater danger to democracy than unlimited power, particularly of unelected power-holders, judges.